LILMGOTW – Niddhog!

Niddhog was one of the games that started my love of quirky indie games. My university LAN party had a tournament concept called ‘Iron-LAN’ where each stage is a different game that is only revealed at that stage. One event the final was Niddhog. Everyone was gripped watching the final as two players battled it out in this unique and odd little game.

It’s an incredibly simple game, and has a definite pick up and play factor. Essentially Player 1 wants to run to the right-hand side of the screen, player 2 wants to run to the left-hand side. You each have a sword that you can use to kill the other player. Once you’ve killed the other player, you can run towards your direction. The other player will periodically spawn in front of you, trying to kill you and regain the running control so that can begin the journey back to their side of the screen. When a player reaches the end of their direction, they win the amazing honour of being eaten by a giant worm to celebrate their victory.

The real pulling factor for this game is the social aspect. It’s quick learning style and simplicity makes it the perfect LAN party or friends visiting game. Anyone can easily get involved and you often end up in close, clinching battles that has banter flowing and everyone at the edge of their seats. The game even supports easy local tournaments, so you can really find out who the undisputed champion is. This is the kind of game that people can really get into and get competitive about.

Given that Niddhog can be picked up very cheaply, Niddhog is a great game and definitely worth it if you love to game on friends. There’s probably not huge amounts of value if you are after a more solo player experience. Much of the fun of this game comes from the social aspect of playing together.

There is now a Niddhog 2. Initial reviews aren’t great – calling it a rehash/reskinned version of the original game, with slightly fancier graphics that almost detract from the game with nothing much new added into terms of game play. One of the best things about Niddhog are the silky smooth controls that are easy to pick up. Niddhog 2 lacks this. With the original so cheap and highly rated, sticking with it seems the best until Niddhog 2 irons out the bugs and drops in price.

Ease of play – 5/5. Super easy controls that are intuitive and quickly picked up.
Graphics – 3/5. The graphics are insanely basic, your sword is a straight line. But that’s all they need to be.
Social Aspect – 5/5. Top social game.
Story Line – NA/5. The storyline is that you want to be eaten by a worm. This game doesn’t need a storyline.
Value – 5/5. It’s super cheap and you definitely get playability from it.
Reliability – 5/5. I’ve never had crashes or refusal to play. It copes with full screen / 4k screen very well.